The air was dry as they descended from the forge.
Ash drifted lightly on the wind—gray flakes that clung to their cloaks and crumbled underfoot. The mountains behind them glowed with fading firelight, but ahead lay only scorched trees and empty valleys. This was a land that had once thrived, now stripped bare.
Aero flew high above, her silhouette wide-winged and majestic. She was nearly the size of a deer now, her feathers fully streaked in silver. With each beat of her wings, she carved quiet space in the sky. The land below her seemed to wait.
Mike followed the new path on the map without speaking. The lines on the parchment had turned sharper, more deliberate. There were fewer forks, fewer questions.
The time for wandering had passed.
It was Ren who broke the silence.
"This place wasn't always like this," he said, his voice low. "Before Vlad, the lands to the south were green. Forests that stretched forever. Lakes you could drink from. People who didn't hide underground."
Mike glanced at him. "You've been here a long time, haven't you?"
Ren stopped walking.
Mike turned.
Ren's jaw clenched. He looked down at the ash between his boots. "I lied when I said I didn't know where I came from."
Mike waited.
Ren lifted his gaze. His amber eyes flickered in the low light. "I was born here. In this world."
Mike's breath caught.
"My parents were part of a resistance—mages, hunters, and old bloodlines that still remembered the covenant. They tried to stand against Vlad. Failed. He sent Moar to… make an example."
He didn't need to say more.
Mike saw it in his eyes. In the tension behind every word.
"I ran," Ren said. "I survived. And I swore I wouldn't fight again. Not unless I had to."
Mike stepped forward. "But you are fighting."
"Because of you." Ren's voice cracked. "Because you made me believe again."
The wind shifted.
Aero landed nearby, folding her wings. She gave a quiet cry and stepped between them, watching both boys as if urging them to speak what mattered.
Ren looked to Mike, eyes hard now. Focused.
"I don't care if the bow chose you. Or if you're the Speaker. None of that means anything unless we do something with it. You've seen the world. You know what's coming."
Mike nodded slowly. "Vlad."
Ren's voice dropped. "He's not a king. He's rot wearing a crown. If we don't stop him, everything this world was—everything it could be—will be gone."
Mike looked down at his hands. He thought of Jake. Of the look on his brother's face when he tried to speak. Of the warning in his eyes. Of the map, the bow, the Phoenix.
Of his father, walking alone into the unknown.
Then he looked at Ren.
"I'm not going home," Mike said quietly. "Not yet. Not until I see this through."
He unrolled the map. The glowing path pulsed brighter than before—leading through ashlands, over dark rivers, toward the carved spires of a distant fortress.
Toward Vlad.
Mike drew an arrow and notched it to the string. The bow hummed, glowing faintly in the growing dark.
"We take him down," he said. "We break his hold. We free this land."
Ren stepped beside him, knife gleaming at his hip.
"Together."
Aero raised her head and let out a cry that echoed across the mountains, a sound that carried far and deep and wide.
Something stirred in the wind.
Ash lifted from the ground like rising dust, curling around them and then clearing—revealing a single black flower blooming between their boots.
Mike knelt and touched it.
Warm.
Alive.
Hope.